I've been ill, ill for several days and I don't care for it much.
I was hoping to go to around to the house of some friends on Thursday and to a party on Friday - but I just stayed in feeling grotty.
There must be a use for snot; I have not yet found one that out-ways its disbenefits. Snot even makes the tissues that I try to burn on the fire a bit too soggy.
It does make me think though, feverishness, not snot.
I find fever excellent for a bit of the old existentialism - and I do like to get out more now that my mind is ..... absorbed.
Beware the elk my friends, beware the elk.
Pxx
Saturday, December 22, 2007
After that all I need is.
All new reality, comes in a bag, comes in a fag hag, comes in a garden.
Did you see my eel boy, where's that fucker been?
I been catchin weasels and puttin them in tins.
Pxxx
Did you see my eel boy, where's that fucker been?
I been catchin weasels and puttin them in tins.
Pxxx
Monday, December 10, 2007
Oh the goose is getting fat, again
Its that Xmas time of year - for getting and giving stuff, more stuff, more and more stuff. Little pieces of plastic, made in China, shipped to the UK, sent around in trucks, sold in shops, wrapped in paper, opened, laughed at, lost, found, binned and dumped in landfill. Ho ho ho.
How sad for the farmers that they have to kill all of their turkeys early - must be heartbreaking being a farmer and so surrounded by death. Death clearly comes as a shock to them - which is odd as it is their only trade.
We're so fat, we're so silly, all wrapped up like a chocolate willy - ho ho ho and a barrel of fun.
How sad for the farmers that they have to kill all of their turkeys early - must be heartbreaking being a farmer and so surrounded by death. Death clearly comes as a shock to them - which is odd as it is their only trade.
We're so fat, we're so silly, all wrapped up like a chocolate willy - ho ho ho and a barrel of fun.
Monday, November 19, 2007
Art and stuff
Friday night, Saturday morning - dancing, gurning, smiling. Excellent.
And in the morning there was a mixture of beauty and vomit - neither of which were mine. We'd had a good time - Mary paid for hers with shakes and vomiting.
I found beauty in everything and wanted to be inside and through everything and everyone - to be at every place in time all at once, to be so deeply immersed in life, joy, pain, death, fever, laughter.... to burst out of my skin and make love to the world.
I dreamed of art - a dozen images of photographs; clipshots of reality. Close-ups of confusion and my usual want for surreal images of flesh and the weather. Corners of mouths, just the folds of skin, the roots of hair, pebbles on the beach, elbows, eyes and ears.
I wanted to be infused with love and to give so much love - to burst out of my skin and let my spirit and soul blend and dance with the world. White clouds merge into the grey, shifting and blurring through the storm; the last leaves cling to trees torn by the sea-wind and freezing rain. A few herring gulls glide and plummet, swoop and steal flashes of light.
Just one mag-pie - "good morning Mr Magpie, hows your wife and kids?".... actually, there is a mag-pie and a crow, I wonder if that affects the ditty... one for sorrow, two (well and mag-pie and a crow) for an excellent Friday night.
I think that has made as much sense I as intended. Love and stuff. Px
And in the morning there was a mixture of beauty and vomit - neither of which were mine. We'd had a good time - Mary paid for hers with shakes and vomiting.
I found beauty in everything and wanted to be inside and through everything and everyone - to be at every place in time all at once, to be so deeply immersed in life, joy, pain, death, fever, laughter.... to burst out of my skin and make love to the world.
I dreamed of art - a dozen images of photographs; clipshots of reality. Close-ups of confusion and my usual want for surreal images of flesh and the weather. Corners of mouths, just the folds of skin, the roots of hair, pebbles on the beach, elbows, eyes and ears.
I wanted to be infused with love and to give so much love - to burst out of my skin and let my spirit and soul blend and dance with the world. White clouds merge into the grey, shifting and blurring through the storm; the last leaves cling to trees torn by the sea-wind and freezing rain. A few herring gulls glide and plummet, swoop and steal flashes of light.
Just one mag-pie - "good morning Mr Magpie, hows your wife and kids?".... actually, there is a mag-pie and a crow, I wonder if that affects the ditty... one for sorrow, two (well and mag-pie and a crow) for an excellent Friday night.
I think that has made as much sense I as intended. Love and stuff. Px
Friday, November 9, 2007
When the light is watching over us
I went out walking after mid-night - sometimes I can only think in song lyrics.
A couple of things have happened to me today to touch me and fill me with some joy. One of them was a small "thank you" that I had almost let slip past without noticing - I'm so glad I saw it.
Its been cold today, winter coming in and the sea looked dark against the sullen sky - a contrast to the sunset last night that filled the horizon with reds and golds from the far west almost to the far east. I watched the sun set - telling my boys to listen to hear it hiss as it touched the sea.
A couple of things have happened to me today to touch me and fill me with some joy. One of them was a small "thank you" that I had almost let slip past without noticing - I'm so glad I saw it.
Its been cold today, winter coming in and the sea looked dark against the sullen sky - a contrast to the sunset last night that filled the horizon with reds and golds from the far west almost to the far east. I watched the sun set - telling my boys to listen to hear it hiss as it touched the sea.
Pxxxxx
Thursday, November 8, 2007
Doors of perception - healing in 5 dimensions
It is a year now since I went on a journey into space, time and probability. Since then I have glimpsed the same journey again, but not made the trip.
We, a fellow traveller and I, met with a profit - she warned us the risks of our adventure, furnished us with fuel and wished us luck on the trip. We took the potion, creation's great delusion - a flower of death - and waited for time to take us into a journey into sound and vision... that was as far as I had thought we would go.
I became scared, feeling sick - colours and sound twisting around, couldn't deal with with low ceilings, the people or the lack of air. We went outside where the footpath and the road, the shops and all of reality breathed in and out - colours changing, pulsing, spinning. The ground moved, sinking with each step like walking on an elastic sheet. The shop windows were filled with magical goods - the footpath, like a conveyor, never ending our steps took us nowhere though we walked lots for eternity.
I was blinded in reality but colours so vivid filled my mind - every now and then I could see and fear the streets, the cars, trams, bikes, taxis, buses, water - how could we walk when we could not talk, or hear, or think. I had to sit, to try to sit and not vomit as I breathed the world in and out of my mind like smoke.
We sat, transfixed in amazement, joy and terror, and technicolor time tripped around and sound danced spiral, paisley, patterns in the sunshine of the past and the future. People passed, echos of reality, looking in, looking on, passing by.
What have you done? what have you done? Time began to play, life passing by - all my past, present and future as vivid as day; a crystal clear, holographic encounter with my soul - laid bare on those streets, drooling - unable to sit, loosing the ability to breath.
Time turning, playing again, running to its ultimate, darkening, shrinking, freezing, stultifying, inescapable death. I shut my eyes, surrendered to the void, embraced death in fear, loss and horror.
Through a void, a compression of reality, through time and back to the start - this vision played again while my loved ones watched: calling "what have you done, oh no, what have you done" looking at me, vegetating, calling "what have you done" - my journey through time repeated again and again - though I may have died many times before I realised that this was happening.
As time continued, repeating, running fast, the snap-shot of life grew smaller until I could see life, time, reality, in its true state. Everything was a matter of an increasingly small, timeless nothing - repeating, repeating, repeating - the only speck of reality, siluetted, in an endless, timeless, dimensionless, void of improbability.
Everything was, as it always had to be, nothing. Nothing - life - ran faster, faster, faster. A vacuum eating a vacuum eating a vacuum - all of everything turning inside out at each and every point at the same time.
So cold, so lost, so trapped - a turmoil of ultimate fear.
So, we sat - heads full of universes, visions unimaginable but nonetheless imagined into reality. We span and shivered all through the night while all about us - through doorways into the madness, reality poked, drunken, violent, accusing, staring.
And - after hours we walked - me blind to any reality, colours spinning four dimensional spiders webs of fractals.
I'm not sure now how much good or bad that night caused me.
I do know that I was pleased to feel the streets beneath my feet and to feel warmth in my clothes - to see again and to hear. I am wiser for the journey and pleased to have returned to life however much I know, as I guess we all do, that life is no more real than that which we perceive and what we perceive is merely a snippet of time - dust on the window of a train from here to infinity.
Love and stuff, P
We, a fellow traveller and I, met with a profit - she warned us the risks of our adventure, furnished us with fuel and wished us luck on the trip. We took the potion, creation's great delusion - a flower of death - and waited for time to take us into a journey into sound and vision... that was as far as I had thought we would go.
I became scared, feeling sick - colours and sound twisting around, couldn't deal with with low ceilings, the people or the lack of air. We went outside where the footpath and the road, the shops and all of reality breathed in and out - colours changing, pulsing, spinning. The ground moved, sinking with each step like walking on an elastic sheet. The shop windows were filled with magical goods - the footpath, like a conveyor, never ending our steps took us nowhere though we walked lots for eternity.
I was blinded in reality but colours so vivid filled my mind - every now and then I could see and fear the streets, the cars, trams, bikes, taxis, buses, water - how could we walk when we could not talk, or hear, or think. I had to sit, to try to sit and not vomit as I breathed the world in and out of my mind like smoke.
We sat, transfixed in amazement, joy and terror, and technicolor time tripped around and sound danced spiral, paisley, patterns in the sunshine of the past and the future. People passed, echos of reality, looking in, looking on, passing by.
What have you done? what have you done? Time began to play, life passing by - all my past, present and future as vivid as day; a crystal clear, holographic encounter with my soul - laid bare on those streets, drooling - unable to sit, loosing the ability to breath.
Time turning, playing again, running to its ultimate, darkening, shrinking, freezing, stultifying, inescapable death. I shut my eyes, surrendered to the void, embraced death in fear, loss and horror.
Through a void, a compression of reality, through time and back to the start - this vision played again while my loved ones watched: calling "what have you done, oh no, what have you done" looking at me, vegetating, calling "what have you done" - my journey through time repeated again and again - though I may have died many times before I realised that this was happening.
As time continued, repeating, running fast, the snap-shot of life grew smaller until I could see life, time, reality, in its true state. Everything was a matter of an increasingly small, timeless nothing - repeating, repeating, repeating - the only speck of reality, siluetted, in an endless, timeless, dimensionless, void of improbability.
Everything was, as it always had to be, nothing. Nothing - life - ran faster, faster, faster. A vacuum eating a vacuum eating a vacuum - all of everything turning inside out at each and every point at the same time.
So cold, so lost, so trapped - a turmoil of ultimate fear.
So, we sat - heads full of universes, visions unimaginable but nonetheless imagined into reality. We span and shivered all through the night while all about us - through doorways into the madness, reality poked, drunken, violent, accusing, staring.
And - after hours we walked - me blind to any reality, colours spinning four dimensional spiders webs of fractals.
I'm not sure now how much good or bad that night caused me.
I do know that I was pleased to feel the streets beneath my feet and to feel warmth in my clothes - to see again and to hear. I am wiser for the journey and pleased to have returned to life however much I know, as I guess we all do, that life is no more real than that which we perceive and what we perceive is merely a snippet of time - dust on the window of a train from here to infinity.
Love and stuff, P
Saturday, October 27, 2007
Healing and learning through the mistakes of others
When I was young, just 12, my sister, Sheila, who was 14 years older than me, killed herself। I was told various versions of events at the time।
It goes like this - she had given birth to my niece early in 7 December and my mum had been down to stay with them to help out. A few days before Christmas my mum came back home and, on Christmas Day, after several desperate 'phone calls, Sheila took an overdose and a few days later she died.
My family, steeped in an odd mixture of spirituality, liberalism and communism, did what I guess few would expect. They tried to act normally - they did not have a funeral of any sort, somehow that seemed, to them, to be the way to react. I suspect they were simply faced with so much pain that they could not face a funeral.
Death, then, and in the event of other deaths, is too much for them. They are not hard and niether are they cowards. But I feel that they are sorely misguided - I think we should go out with a bang, a celebration of the life lived, the hope and light brought into the world.
Very little has even been spoken about the sadness of Sheila's death and although her life has not been a taboo subject it was not something that, as I child, I felt I could discuss. We did not do discussions. In fact, looking back, I think the effects of the change that her death brought were greater than I realised to be apparent at the time.
I was pretty much left alone as a teenager - I was be no means a tearaway, perhaps that is because I had nothing to rebel against. No one seemed to be particularly interested in where I was, so being out late or coming home drunk at 13 and throughout my teenage years was not an issue - barely even noticed.
This year, my niece and I both found that we needed to talk to each other about Sheila - me as the brother who had had so little to do with her (she had moved away when I was much younger) and her, Sheila's daughter. She felt left, abandoned - how else could she feel. I think she feels less of that now - but its not for me to speak for her.
Both of us feeling there were parts of the picture missing I wrote off for a copy of the inquest into Sheila's death. And, in the meantime, I wondered about whether she had really intended, wanted, to die. Had it been a cry for help that had gone wrong - the desperate low of a person with post natal depression and, like me, I suspect, probably prone to depression (and slight manic highs) at times.
I did some research into the drug that I remembered she had overdosed on and found to my amazement that it had been withdrawn from use because of a dangerously high rate of fatal, accidental, overdoses. This tended to fix in my mind that it had been a cry for help that had gone tragically wrong.
Then the report arrived. Most of what I had been told checked out - more or less. What struck me was the use of English - so dry, so clinical, so dispassionate, about the death of such a young woman who had only just had a baby. What burned a different image into my mind was when I read the account of how she had been found - the pills had been her second attempt, with alcohol, following her first attempt, to slash her wrists with a chisel... she had not managed to cut herself deeply enough.
Sheila was always in my mind as full of laughter and fun and that is the person that has been described to me as I grew up. Her photographs - tiny, only 4 foot 10 inches tall - all curls and smiles and floppy hippy hat.
And, you'll know if you have read any of the other things that I have written here, that I understand depression from the inside. I learnt as a child that the pain that the deliberate, death of a child causes within a family - and so much greater that pain when one knows how acute Sheila's pain was when death was the best and to her, the only, rational, option.
I resented at times that that knowledge held me back when my depression made me feel that death was the best and most rational option for changing my situation. Knowing, and caring, about the outcome of suicide on others made me know that I would not even have it as an option to allow me to escape my personal pain. Trapped in a life, hated.
I have no questions with suicide. It is so, so, horrendous that when genuinely sought I know that it is, for that individual, what they believe to be the only remaining option for them. The healing comes through guiding that person - taking their hand, allowing them to see the love and the value of life - not letting them take the choice they believe they need to make without showing them that there is, all around them, value, hope and a reason for life. If they still cannot see that then I understand if they make the choice - but it must be a choice.... and with choice it is hard to choose the worst option.
So, no, the mistake is not the sad suicide of my sister. The mistake is my family's failure to understand the value of deep and true grief and the value of deep and true joy. Death and life are inextricable; yes the party is over and theres a load of crap to clear up, but didn't we have a damn good time?!
Perhaps for my family the very circumstances of Sheila's death - the ultimate tragic death, a death so clearly only caused by sadness - prevented them from seeing the need to have a funeral. The need to draw a line - to say thanks, thanks - just thank you for having been alive - that is all we need of you, you gave us everything you had to give, thank you.
Death brings confusion; death and life are all one. Always, always, go with the confusion - dive into life, swim in the waves of passion, sing with the very joy of being and when death comes, allow it to heal and feed the seeds of new life.
Much love, P
It goes like this - she had given birth to my niece early in 7 December and my mum had been down to stay with them to help out. A few days before Christmas my mum came back home and, on Christmas Day, after several desperate 'phone calls, Sheila took an overdose and a few days later she died.
My family, steeped in an odd mixture of spirituality, liberalism and communism, did what I guess few would expect. They tried to act normally - they did not have a funeral of any sort, somehow that seemed, to them, to be the way to react. I suspect they were simply faced with so much pain that they could not face a funeral.
Death, then, and in the event of other deaths, is too much for them. They are not hard and niether are they cowards. But I feel that they are sorely misguided - I think we should go out with a bang, a celebration of the life lived, the hope and light brought into the world.
Very little has even been spoken about the sadness of Sheila's death and although her life has not been a taboo subject it was not something that, as I child, I felt I could discuss. We did not do discussions. In fact, looking back, I think the effects of the change that her death brought were greater than I realised to be apparent at the time.
I was pretty much left alone as a teenager - I was be no means a tearaway, perhaps that is because I had nothing to rebel against. No one seemed to be particularly interested in where I was, so being out late or coming home drunk at 13 and throughout my teenage years was not an issue - barely even noticed.
This year, my niece and I both found that we needed to talk to each other about Sheila - me as the brother who had had so little to do with her (she had moved away when I was much younger) and her, Sheila's daughter. She felt left, abandoned - how else could she feel. I think she feels less of that now - but its not for me to speak for her.
Both of us feeling there were parts of the picture missing I wrote off for a copy of the inquest into Sheila's death. And, in the meantime, I wondered about whether she had really intended, wanted, to die. Had it been a cry for help that had gone wrong - the desperate low of a person with post natal depression and, like me, I suspect, probably prone to depression (and slight manic highs) at times.
I did some research into the drug that I remembered she had overdosed on and found to my amazement that it had been withdrawn from use because of a dangerously high rate of fatal, accidental, overdoses. This tended to fix in my mind that it had been a cry for help that had gone tragically wrong.
Then the report arrived. Most of what I had been told checked out - more or less. What struck me was the use of English - so dry, so clinical, so dispassionate, about the death of such a young woman who had only just had a baby. What burned a different image into my mind was when I read the account of how she had been found - the pills had been her second attempt, with alcohol, following her first attempt, to slash her wrists with a chisel... she had not managed to cut herself deeply enough.
Sheila was always in my mind as full of laughter and fun and that is the person that has been described to me as I grew up. Her photographs - tiny, only 4 foot 10 inches tall - all curls and smiles and floppy hippy hat.
And, you'll know if you have read any of the other things that I have written here, that I understand depression from the inside. I learnt as a child that the pain that the deliberate, death of a child causes within a family - and so much greater that pain when one knows how acute Sheila's pain was when death was the best and to her, the only, rational, option.
I resented at times that that knowledge held me back when my depression made me feel that death was the best and most rational option for changing my situation. Knowing, and caring, about the outcome of suicide on others made me know that I would not even have it as an option to allow me to escape my personal pain. Trapped in a life, hated.
I have no questions with suicide. It is so, so, horrendous that when genuinely sought I know that it is, for that individual, what they believe to be the only remaining option for them. The healing comes through guiding that person - taking their hand, allowing them to see the love and the value of life - not letting them take the choice they believe they need to make without showing them that there is, all around them, value, hope and a reason for life. If they still cannot see that then I understand if they make the choice - but it must be a choice.... and with choice it is hard to choose the worst option.
So, no, the mistake is not the sad suicide of my sister. The mistake is my family's failure to understand the value of deep and true grief and the value of deep and true joy. Death and life are inextricable; yes the party is over and theres a load of crap to clear up, but didn't we have a damn good time?!
Perhaps for my family the very circumstances of Sheila's death - the ultimate tragic death, a death so clearly only caused by sadness - prevented them from seeing the need to have a funeral. The need to draw a line - to say thanks, thanks - just thank you for having been alive - that is all we need of you, you gave us everything you had to give, thank you.
Death brings confusion; death and life are all one. Always, always, go with the confusion - dive into life, swim in the waves of passion, sing with the very joy of being and when death comes, allow it to heal and feed the seeds of new life.
Much love, P
Wednesday, October 24, 2007
Panic, Wales and Driving
I was pleased with myself this week. I managed to drive to Wales (about 280 miles from where I live) without having a major panic attack while driving. Felt a bit odd at times but nothing big or heartstoppingly terrifying!
This marks quiet an improvement since starting on the citrolopram. Before taking it I had to take several propanadol (beta-blokers) to be able to drive at all - and, if you have taken them you will know that staying awake after just 2 40mg propanadol is pretty hard going.... so not the best way to be when driving.
Wales is splendidly beutiful - rocks and rivers, waterfalls and flowers. Children loved it. My partner's mother's cooking is unusual; but we were blessed, she did not cook. In a way though I miss the looks we have to exchange while lifting a fork of indescribably, indescribable, stuff (the like of which I cannot describe) to our mouths.... hoping that we can wash it down quickly enough with harsh red wine that it does not leave a taste, of any sort, to linger.
I returned to work today. Got in late. Decided to have longer in bed and to see the children before heading in. It had clearly been a bad idea to go on leave.
All sorts of mad panic was happening - three different sets of people all demanding immediate briefing for the top boss all at the same time. One of them had asked for a "detailed" briefing on all of the points that he might need to cover in a particularly difficult meeting. I had prepared something that I considered covered all the points at a reasonible level of detail - 4 sides of type covering issues that had been in the press, legal action against us, legal duties, postive points to say etc. Today, I was asked to cut this to less than a single sheet of paper and to do so by 12 - it was 11:50.
Just 2 days out of the office and 300 e-mails sitting there - not one single one junk as my filters work very well - just 6 saying that I had urgent voicemail messages. These all turned out to be people who had seen my "out of office" message on my e-mail and who had decided that I would be more "in the office" if they called and left a phone message and that this would make it more likely that I would respond.
Oddly, only one person decided to call me on my mobile while I was on leave. To ask the exact date by which we were due to hit a target that we have not a hope in hell of meeting within 10 years of the date..... I could not remember if it was 31 March 08 or 1 April 08 and pointed out the "not a hope in hell" factor and said that it did not matter much either way - this was said to be unprofessional.
And, I am pleased to say that all of this only left me minorly angry and irritated. I think that a few weeks ago all of this - and these are only the highlights of the day - might have been enough to send me spinning into a right mess....
So, the pills are working - hooobloodyray.
This marks quiet an improvement since starting on the citrolopram. Before taking it I had to take several propanadol (beta-blokers) to be able to drive at all - and, if you have taken them you will know that staying awake after just 2 40mg propanadol is pretty hard going.... so not the best way to be when driving.
Wales is splendidly beutiful - rocks and rivers, waterfalls and flowers. Children loved it. My partner's mother's cooking is unusual; but we were blessed, she did not cook. In a way though I miss the looks we have to exchange while lifting a fork of indescribably, indescribable, stuff (the like of which I cannot describe) to our mouths.... hoping that we can wash it down quickly enough with harsh red wine that it does not leave a taste, of any sort, to linger.
I returned to work today. Got in late. Decided to have longer in bed and to see the children before heading in. It had clearly been a bad idea to go on leave.
All sorts of mad panic was happening - three different sets of people all demanding immediate briefing for the top boss all at the same time. One of them had asked for a "detailed" briefing on all of the points that he might need to cover in a particularly difficult meeting. I had prepared something that I considered covered all the points at a reasonible level of detail - 4 sides of type covering issues that had been in the press, legal action against us, legal duties, postive points to say etc. Today, I was asked to cut this to less than a single sheet of paper and to do so by 12 - it was 11:50.
Just 2 days out of the office and 300 e-mails sitting there - not one single one junk as my filters work very well - just 6 saying that I had urgent voicemail messages. These all turned out to be people who had seen my "out of office" message on my e-mail and who had decided that I would be more "in the office" if they called and left a phone message and that this would make it more likely that I would respond.
Oddly, only one person decided to call me on my mobile while I was on leave. To ask the exact date by which we were due to hit a target that we have not a hope in hell of meeting within 10 years of the date..... I could not remember if it was 31 March 08 or 1 April 08 and pointed out the "not a hope in hell" factor and said that it did not matter much either way - this was said to be unprofessional.
And, I am pleased to say that all of this only left me minorly angry and irritated. I think that a few weeks ago all of this - and these are only the highlights of the day - might have been enough to send me spinning into a right mess....
So, the pills are working - hooobloodyray.
Tuesday, October 16, 2007
Yoga and when it is best to avoid it
For some considerable time my partner has told me - nagged me - to go to yoga.
I would rather not. I remember a tv programme about yoga in the early 1970s, when I was a child. I was deeply affected by the sight of blurry hippy types bending and posing in unbecoming, stretchy, things... garb. I think that vision has been burnt into my brain. Its not helped by the fact that whenever I have witnessed yoga my only thought is that its pretty unsightly - gussets stretched, legs akimbo.
I do not want to be a lion or a rising sun or whatever else it is that they get up to. Bending is not for me.
So, I have been avoiding it but beating myself up about it - knowing that it is good for me and knowing that I am bad and in need of goodness. It will, I know, allow me to be more bendy and more trendy - more in touch with my soul as I peer at my own hole - twisted, distorted and free from stress.
I'd rather not. I'd rather stick tape to myself and pull it off slowly - I'd rather sit in the rain and an old wolly jumper feeling smelly and damp.
What is for me - well, not complete idleness. Give me some deep thumping bass, a rhythm and I'll bounce about - all night. I'd much rather bounce than bend.
I would rather not. I remember a tv programme about yoga in the early 1970s, when I was a child. I was deeply affected by the sight of blurry hippy types bending and posing in unbecoming, stretchy, things... garb. I think that vision has been burnt into my brain. Its not helped by the fact that whenever I have witnessed yoga my only thought is that its pretty unsightly - gussets stretched, legs akimbo.
I do not want to be a lion or a rising sun or whatever else it is that they get up to. Bending is not for me.
So, I have been avoiding it but beating myself up about it - knowing that it is good for me and knowing that I am bad and in need of goodness. It will, I know, allow me to be more bendy and more trendy - more in touch with my soul as I peer at my own hole - twisted, distorted and free from stress.
I'd rather not. I'd rather stick tape to myself and pull it off slowly - I'd rather sit in the rain and an old wolly jumper feeling smelly and damp.
What is for me - well, not complete idleness. Give me some deep thumping bass, a rhythm and I'll bounce about - all night. I'd much rather bounce than bend.
Monday, October 15, 2007
Squirrel Poem
I had a little squirrel
I kept him in a barrow
I pushed him to the Wirrel
And killed him with a marrow
I kept him in a barrow
I pushed him to the Wirrel
And killed him with a marrow
Thursday, October 11, 2007
Healing - On the mysteries of Harry Edwards
It was a mystery to me how I would be related to a well known spiritual healer - Harry Edwards, my grandfather.
There is not a great deal spiritual about me - at least not in the way that I understand that he was.... healing with the spirit of another.
I do though have a feeling for how people can be healed and that there may well be people who are better placed to channel that healing than others - to act as guides. I think that healing is both a state of mind and a state of motion or change.
We can only be healed and change to be how we would like to be once we have better understood our own state of mind and seen for ourselves that we have the power within us to make that change. I cannot change someone else - I cannot heal them - any more than anyone can change someone else through force of will.
There are clearly physical ways to change someone - to sooth or harm - and how we behave may well have an effect. But is the other person's reaction to our behaviour that is the change - they make that change and, as we so often see, how another reacts is not often what we expect, at least not entirely.
I'm thinking about how to channel others into healing themselves. Here there may be a link to Harry Edwards - a desire to heal through a medium that naturally presents itself whatever than may be.
For him his medium aligned with his more spiritual life. For me, I don't know for sure - but if I have an ability to help with healing then it would be through the person themself with me.
I know that it is commonly said that change can only come from within the individual without the influence of others. But is that really so, it rather flies in the face of common experience - we so often have others to guide us, sometimes in a better way, sometimes not. Impossed change, as I have said, rarely works convincingly - but I believe shared, colabative change can work.
We so often start with what we believe to be the certainties in life - the benchmarks against which we judge our current state and assess where we would like to be... or determine where we feel we will never reach. It makes some sense in terms of logic to know where one is starting from on a journey. But, I am taking about changing to a healed state - its all about understanding where to go and sometimes that means ignoring where we are starting from. We may not actually be able to change the facts, our upbringing, financial status, health, but we can change our reaction to them - with help.
A similarity with my views and those of more spiritual people is my own growing realisation of the power of faith in the unknown. Not an unknown God or spirit but an as yet unknown... just that. There is plenty to be gained from going with the confusion.
Some more another day.
There is not a great deal spiritual about me - at least not in the way that I understand that he was.... healing with the spirit of another.
I do though have a feeling for how people can be healed and that there may well be people who are better placed to channel that healing than others - to act as guides. I think that healing is both a state of mind and a state of motion or change.
We can only be healed and change to be how we would like to be once we have better understood our own state of mind and seen for ourselves that we have the power within us to make that change. I cannot change someone else - I cannot heal them - any more than anyone can change someone else through force of will.
There are clearly physical ways to change someone - to sooth or harm - and how we behave may well have an effect. But is the other person's reaction to our behaviour that is the change - they make that change and, as we so often see, how another reacts is not often what we expect, at least not entirely.
I'm thinking about how to channel others into healing themselves. Here there may be a link to Harry Edwards - a desire to heal through a medium that naturally presents itself whatever than may be.
For him his medium aligned with his more spiritual life. For me, I don't know for sure - but if I have an ability to help with healing then it would be through the person themself with me.
I know that it is commonly said that change can only come from within the individual without the influence of others. But is that really so, it rather flies in the face of common experience - we so often have others to guide us, sometimes in a better way, sometimes not. Impossed change, as I have said, rarely works convincingly - but I believe shared, colabative change can work.
We so often start with what we believe to be the certainties in life - the benchmarks against which we judge our current state and assess where we would like to be... or determine where we feel we will never reach. It makes some sense in terms of logic to know where one is starting from on a journey. But, I am taking about changing to a healed state - its all about understanding where to go and sometimes that means ignoring where we are starting from. We may not actually be able to change the facts, our upbringing, financial status, health, but we can change our reaction to them - with help.
A similarity with my views and those of more spiritual people is my own growing realisation of the power of faith in the unknown. Not an unknown God or spirit but an as yet unknown... just that. There is plenty to be gained from going with the confusion.
Some more another day.
Wednesday, October 10, 2007
Citrolopram and history to today
Today - I was tired. How did I get here; a journey through sleeplessness from yesterday to today. I put the world to rights. Organised work. Entered a dream I had not seen before and contemplated citrolopram.
Would the drug moderate my thoughts - lift the lows, smooth the panic. Turn me bland.
Well, as I mentioned to my boses when I started on this course of drugs a couple of weeks ago "I've been down this route before - no big deal". I have been dragged out on this road before.
Amitriptaline, Sertraline, Dophiapine and now Citrolopram. Sanity comes and goes - actually, depression, thats not insanity just nasty, self-soul-death. The manicness and the panic - that feels like insanity.
The first time I realised that the miserableness I had was more than just a dip, a low, was in 1986. Back, back in the mists of time through curtains and curtains of drink and drugs. I don't think it scared me then - I just wanted a release and I had enough sense to know that the doctor would have some sort of release for me.
It was though a release through ultimate blandness - flat, dead, empty moods. And empty pointless life of beer, telly and noodles - getting fatter and smellier but simply no longer caring about it.
It was after that - once I'd got over it that I became scared of getting bad again. I began to cherish the sanity now; now that I knew what it was like to have lost it.
So - 1995 I lost it again and fell into a hole of depression again - a desire only to drown in the river Lea followed closely by a desire to drink and take as much dope and speed as possible. So I went back to the doctor and got some sertraline and bounced about like a fucking stupid monkey climbing up the walls of nothing.
Mania - tears a my muscles, sucks the oxygen from my blood, speads my head, shouts my thoughts, speaks and whispers and shouts all manner of thoughts - confuses. So, back to the doctor and then to a psychatrist and on to dophiapine as well as sertraline - to calm the madness.
And there I was again - flat, tired, calm.
And I got over it - passed it by. I spend the next 10 years finding ways to keep myself busy and happy... mainly busy. Keep the evil away from my idle hands.
But now, again, even with so much to do - or probably because of too much to do and no power over my situation here I am again - actually I do have power, I just don't feel able to exert it - perhaps thats what it is.... I'll think about that one.
So now I feel crippled with depression but now it comes after the mania heralds the way - a cavalcade of 10,000 tuneless trumpeters, hopping, jumping. Down my street - pied-pipers of insanity, pulling me out of the house and pressing me in to the service of so many sinking ships.
So, today - I'll end this story here.
Would the drug moderate my thoughts - lift the lows, smooth the panic. Turn me bland.
Well, as I mentioned to my boses when I started on this course of drugs a couple of weeks ago "I've been down this route before - no big deal". I have been dragged out on this road before.
Amitriptaline, Sertraline, Dophiapine and now Citrolopram. Sanity comes and goes - actually, depression, thats not insanity just nasty, self-soul-death. The manicness and the panic - that feels like insanity.
The first time I realised that the miserableness I had was more than just a dip, a low, was in 1986. Back, back in the mists of time through curtains and curtains of drink and drugs. I don't think it scared me then - I just wanted a release and I had enough sense to know that the doctor would have some sort of release for me.
It was though a release through ultimate blandness - flat, dead, empty moods. And empty pointless life of beer, telly and noodles - getting fatter and smellier but simply no longer caring about it.
It was after that - once I'd got over it that I became scared of getting bad again. I began to cherish the sanity now; now that I knew what it was like to have lost it.
So - 1995 I lost it again and fell into a hole of depression again - a desire only to drown in the river Lea followed closely by a desire to drink and take as much dope and speed as possible. So I went back to the doctor and got some sertraline and bounced about like a fucking stupid monkey climbing up the walls of nothing.
Mania - tears a my muscles, sucks the oxygen from my blood, speads my head, shouts my thoughts, speaks and whispers and shouts all manner of thoughts - confuses. So, back to the doctor and then to a psychatrist and on to dophiapine as well as sertraline - to calm the madness.
And there I was again - flat, tired, calm.
And I got over it - passed it by. I spend the next 10 years finding ways to keep myself busy and happy... mainly busy. Keep the evil away from my idle hands.
But now, again, even with so much to do - or probably because of too much to do and no power over my situation here I am again - actually I do have power, I just don't feel able to exert it - perhaps thats what it is.... I'll think about that one.
So now I feel crippled with depression but now it comes after the mania heralds the way - a cavalcade of 10,000 tuneless trumpeters, hopping, jumping. Down my street - pied-pipers of insanity, pulling me out of the house and pressing me in to the service of so many sinking ships.
So, today - I'll end this story here.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)